“I want the marriage carried out, devoid of all but its religious ceremony. I want to spend one month in the home prepared for us, and then I will submit to the punishment and schooling proposed.”
“No, you will not. Do not throw away this opportunity to retrieve your so far neglected, misguided life. There is a great man in you, if you will give him space and opportunity to develop, John. This is the wide open door of Opportunity; go through, and go up to where it will lead you. At any rate do whatever Thora advises. I 255 can trust you as far as Thora can.” Then he held out his hand, and Ian, too deeply moved to speak, took it and left the cathedral without a word.
He found Thora alone in the parlour. She had evidently been weeping but that fact did not much soothe his sense of wrong and injustice. He felt that he had been put aside in some measure. He was not sure that even now Thora had been weeping for his loss. He told himself, she was just as likely to have been mourning for Boris. He felt that he was unjustly angry but, oh, he was so hopeless! Every one was ready to give him advice, no one had said to him those little words of loving sympathy for which his heart was hungry. He had felt it to be his duty to try and console Thora, and Thora had wept in his arms and he had kissed her tears away. She was now weary with weeping and suffering with headache. She knew also that talking against any decision of her father’s was useless. When he had said the word, the man or woman that could move him did not live. Acceptance of the will of others was a duty she had learned to observe all her life, it was just the duty that Ian had thought it right to resist. So amid all his love and disappointment, there was a cruel sense of being of secondary interest 256 and importance, just at the very time he had expected to be first in everyone’s love and consideration.
Finally he said, “Dear Thora, I can feel no longer. My heart has become hopeless. I suffer too much. I will go to my room and try and submit to this last cruel wrong.”
Then Thora was offended. “There is no one to blame for this last cruel wrong but thyself,” she answered. “The death of Boris was a nearer thing to my father and mother than my marriage. Thy marriage can take place at some other time, but for my dear brother there is no future in this life.”
“Are you even sure of his death?”
“My mother has seen him.”
“That is nonsense.”
“To you, I dare say it is. Mother sees more than any one else can see. She has spiritual vision. We are not yet able for it, nor worthy of it.”
“Then why did she not see our wedding catastrophe? She might have averted it by changing the date.”